Nuclear cost analysis needed

Until the Alliance for Nuclear Responsibility was founded in early 2005, California seemed to have forgotten the cost to San Diego residents of inadequate planning for energy supplies, a fiasco that precipitated California’s ongoing budget shortfall. Both Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) and Southern California Edison (SCE) had been investigating extending the operating licenses for their aging reactors and the state had no open proceedings to determine what reliance on continued operation of nuclear plants would cost. Then in summer of 2005, after two days of hearings that included all PG&E and SCE stakeholders, the California Energy Commission recommended that the “Legislature develop a suitable state framework to review the costs and benefits of nuclear power plant operation.”

Seven years later the alliance is still the only ratepayer voice at all state hearings, workshops and/or conferences regarding nuclear costs. And a decade after the state’s “energy crisis,” Southern California is still reliant on a nuclear plant designed in 1967 and a dilapidated grid system.

The Energy Commission and the alliance have called for a cost analysis of the state’s dependence on San Onofre and Diablo Canyon. The CPUC (California Public Utilities Commission) and CA-ISO (California Independent System Operator Corporation) joined this call only after several months without power from San Onofre and are finally looking at budgeting for and exploring replacement power scenarios. The State Water Resources Control Board began proceedings on the impacts of the million gallons per minute of seawater needed to operate the reactors and appointed the alliance to serve on the nuclear issues oversight committee. In 2011 the Legislature held special hearings on the lessons California needs to learn from Japan’s Fukushima nightmare and invited the alliance to participate.

The ongoing situation at San Onofre makes it clear that we need a full analysis of all costs of aging reactors – it is a fiscal reality that eclipses pro-or-anti-nuclear sentiment. What will alternatives to present cooling problems, radioactive waste storage, expanded emergency plans, updated seismic studies and additional repairs and replacements cost? How will these investments compare to the costs of alternatives that would provide jobs, new resources and infrastructure, and increased dependability of future generation? Those are questions that the alliance has been asking the state since 2005. Today, the business community and homeowners need to add their voices to these pressing concerns.

Our campaign has been economics-driven and our bipartisan message has opened door after door, regardless of any individual’s position on nuclear power. Last month the alliance asked the Nuclear Regulatory Commission why it had not provided the same in-depth analysis before approving SCE’s steam generator project that it is now applying to figure out what went wrong – after the state has already passed the cost onto ratepayers. We asked SCE’s CEO, Ted Craver, if the utility had a “number“ in mind that would make repairs/replacement too costly to continue. Though Mr. Craver did not have a number he was willing to share, it should be clear that his investors will be paying the bill, as the CPUC placed a cap on SCE’s project and there is little doubt that the cap has been exceeded. SCE accepted defective steam generators, the NRC approved the project, and repairs must be a shareholder liability as they receive a guaranteed 11.5 percent rate of return on their investment. Like Gen. Colin Powell said, “You break it, you own it.”

The liabilities from Fukushima are approaching $150 billion, while the liability limits in the U.S. remain at $12 billion. This June, nine major Japanese industry bodies urged their government to engineer economic growth and cut Japan’s reliance on nuclear power. The lobby groups made the request in a joint document for submission to government bodies.

California – not the federal government – must decide if financing aging reactors is in the state’s best interest. Ratepayers must demand that all costs of continued operation are on the table before they are asked for one more nuclear penny.

There will be difficult decisions ahead as California plans its energy future, but one thing is clear: The state cannot follow the example of the NRC and continue to rely solely on the claims of the utilities for its data when approving funding without independent review. In the words of President Reagan, we must “trust, but verify” and demand full disclosure of nuclear costs as those decisions are made.

Becker, a San Diego resident, is executive director of Alliance for Nuclear Responsibility, www.a4nr.org